Beyond Financial Aid data dictionary

Description: Undergraduate adult learners by full and part time status in the Fall 2015 semester

Date Range: Fall 2015

Data sources: ADC (Academic Data Collection)

Additional Information:

“Adult Learners” are defined as those that are 25 or older as of the Fall 2015 semester. This is different from the SER definition of adult learner where an individual is 25 or older as of matriculation.

Used IPEDS definition of FTF: A degree-seeking undergraduate student who enrolls in college for the first time in a fall term, or the preceding summer term. To be IPEDS FTF, the student cannot be a transfer student, unless the student was enrolled at another System institution in the preceding summer term and graduated from high school in the same year as enrollment. Also included are students who attended college prior to the summer/fall term of enrollment as part of a dual enrollment program while they were still high school students. This definition is set forth by the National Center for Education Statistics, which maintains the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS).

The graduation rates are based on 150% time (6 years from entry for bachelor’s and 3 years for Associate’s).

Description: Average amount of loan debt (among those with loan debt) of bachelor’s and associate’s degree awardees

Date Range: Fiscal year 2015

Data sources: ADC (Academic Data Collection)

Additional Information:

If an institution has fewer than 10 graduates with loans on either degree program, it was not included on the infographics to protect students’ privacy.

Community Data:

Median family income of communities where students are from:

Description: Median family income of census block group of student’s permanent address at matriculation (Values used for different years of income are nominal values, i.e. not adjusted for inflation.)

Date Range: 2014 to 2016 Academic Years

Data sources: Longitudinal database created as part of USG/Carl Vinson Institute of Government data demonstration project. It consists of data from the ADC appended by data from the US Census and American Community Survey.

Percent of population without a college degree in communities where students are from:

Description: Percent of the population 25 years and over with associate’s or higher of census block group of student’s permanent address at matriculation

Date Range: 2014 to 2016 Academic Year

Data sources: Longitudinal database created as part of USG/Carl Vinson Institute of Government data demonstration project. It consists of data from the ADC appended by data from the US Census and American Community Survey.

Community Data:

Graduation rates by test scores and family income:

Data sources: Affluent Students Have an Advantage and the Fap is Widening, December 12, 2012, New York Times based on research from Bown, W.G., Chingos, M.M., and McPherson, M.S. (2009). Crossing the Finish Line: Completing College at America’s Public Universities. Princeton, N.J.; Princeton University Press.

All the requested data elements on infographics were from special run reports by ITS. The “Adult learners by full-time, part-time” and “Adult learners as a percent of total enrollment” have similar SER reports, but the adult population in the SER is the definition where it is adults as of when they matriculated, not as of the term of the report like we requested.